


Music from the Heart

by almostunadulteratedmiracle



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2019-10-22 08:37:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 17,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17659430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/almostunadulteratedmiracle/pseuds/almostunadulteratedmiracle
Summary: Aziraphale and Crowley had been through a lot throughout the ages, but the ups and downs both were needed for them to finally fully accept each others' company. And some occult / ethereal mysteries thrown into the mix don't hurt too much either. Or maybe they do - if they are mysteries great enough to make one of them completely forget that an incredibly important anniversary is coming up...





	1. Prologue - In the Belly of the Beast

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for macdicilla for the 2017 Good Omens Holiday Exchange.   
> (Only, I wasn't on ao3 then, and I might be posting slowly now. But since I have only two fics that are not continuations of continuations of AUs or fics, I thought I should have them together here.)

_ December 2020 (N.S.), Ma-no Umi (Sea of the Devil) _

_ “Quiet. Just be quiet. Just keep everything quiet. Just. Don’t. Wake. Him. Up.” _

The reminder was completely unnecessary, yet Crowley’s mind helpfully kept replaying it with every awkward and painfully slow tiptoeing step he took. The human body was decidedly not made for stealthy movement – not underwater, at least. He would have much preferred to still be a smaller and far less noticeable serpent… but changing forms was currently somewhere beyond the further edge of impossible.

A deep rumbling noise reminded him what exactly he was trying to leave behind, and he quickened his steps on the slippery cover of algae over the ground. A moment later, he could have screamed-

_ (“Shut up, shut up, shut up, don’t make a sound!”) _

\- when a distant shipwreck began a blood-freezingly loud, creaking descent from its unsteady resting place. The rumbling started up again, the beast sounding less sleepy and much angrier this time around. Subtlety be blessed, Crowley kicked himself off the rocks of the seabed, and swam towards the cavern as fast as he could. 

Although he hadn’t used his wings underwater in centuries, they still carried him with more speed than he had hoped for: he overshot the entrance to the cave entirely, and got caught up in a current that definitely should not have been there. It carried him along spiky, serpentine corridors, throwing him against hard walls and pushing him up and down impossibly long shafts, all of it with the swiftness of a misaligned comet falling into the Sun…

… only to spit him out into a large, _dry_ chamber underneath a dome of water.

At first, he did not dare to move. 

_ “Is he awake? Is he… does he know?” _

Apparently though, no one knew that he had found the place he had been looking for. (Or that the place had found him. Semantics.)

The desert-dry and void-quiet chamber was still enough to keep him unnerved.

_ “Best get this over with.” _

He stood up on the eerily lifeless ground, took care of his bruises with a few miracles, and hid his wings – there wouldn’t have been much use for them down _wherever on Earth this was_. Aside from the water-dome on top, the chamber possessed only one exit: a hole barely tall enough for a man (or man-shaped creature in this case) to go through without constantly bumping their head into the artificially smooth ceiling. Crowley could barely wait to reach the end of the claustrophobic corridor. To him, such a structure was very suspect: why would this a simple (albeit uncomfortable) path lead to such unspeakable treasure? With every step he expected to find himself in the jaws of a trap.

However, the tunnel simply opened into a much wider corridor, which, again, led straight ahead into impenetrable darkness. And steeply down. Not that a demon would not be used to that. After the stormy entry, this part was almost enjoyable.

_ “Just like Indiana Jones,” _ Crowley thought to himself proudly. Only, this artefact would be beyond the wildest dreams of any human professor of archaeology, fictional or otherwise.

Barely had Crowley reached that conclusion, he tripped over something, and fell flat on his face. As the ground and the walls of the tunnel both started shaking violently, he forgot all about the sound of a wire snapping that his ears had only just been able to catch, and scrambled to his feet. Looking for the source of the vibrations, he whirled around just in time to see a section of the ceiling open up and slide entirely out of view, letting a giant boulder fall into the now very understandably inclined corridor.

_ “Just like Indiana Jones,” _ he thought bitterly, as he turned away from the ominous spectacle, and started to run.


	2. Just Before the Beginning

_ 26 October 4004 BC (O. S.), somewhere on Earth _

One day of Creation was a very long time. Presently, though, nobody could imagine how impossibly long they would once seem. All that the solemn, eternally busy inhabitants of the Heavenly Kingdom knew was that one such day was enough for an entire flock of freshly made angels to grow into their roles. (It should have been, at any rate.)

And the Fifth Day had just come to its end.

A still smallish angel with bright golden eyes and emerald feathers forgot all about the phoenix-nest they were going to make, and turned their eyes to the sky in wonder. Louder than the burrowing of worms, deeper than the whistles of whales, and more adorned with decoration than the melodies chirped by every single bird created, a new song had caught their attention. A new part in the harmony reverberating through the entire Cosmos, a new start to the revolutions of the planets, a new hum for a new era of the expanding Universe: the Sixth Day was starting.

The song was warm as it had ever been – as _the Word_ had ever been – and they could listen to it forever.

“Cathetel!”

Someone was calling their name, faintly, as though it had been spoken underwater. But why would anyone speak to them from underwater? 

_ “I know,” _ the emerald-winged angel thought, _“I will listen for the answer.”_

Because the melody knew. The cosmic song knew all.

Interspersed between the echoes of an igniting chain of supernovae, coded into thrills of Venus, the music brought them the answer. 

A look of absolute elation passed through their face, before it morphed into an expression of sudden horror. The mighty Ba’al-zebul was towering above the small angel, irritated in the extreme, having called their name three times already.

“Cathetel, you are to report to Eden immediately!”

“Y-yes, Sir!” the young angel whimpered, their golden eyes still wide with fear.

“And stop getting distracted by the Music of the Spheres. You will have all the time in the worlds to listen to it later,” the other added more mildly. “Right now, you have new animals to get to know. Our Father is Creating again.”

“Yes,” the smaller angel agreed swiftly, the crown of their green feathers trembling in excitement. “I hear one of them is really long and sleek and-”

“Cathetel, what did I just tell you about the Music?”

“Sorry, Sir.”

“Run along now, or you won’t even have time to meet the snakes you appear so very enthused by.”

“Yes, Sir!” Cathetel laughed, their eyes shining with curiosity as they flew to the old-new Garden.


	3. Peace

_ 12\. December 1020 (O. S.), near Canterbury _

Crowley never would have thought that one day, he might feel even the tiniest bit beholden to a man of the church. Let alone two of those.

Although currently, he donned the clothes of a nobleman, he hoped to blame it on being drunk as a fiddler.

In the company of his mortal enemy.

Well. Of his former mortal enemy.

He’d been trying to get the blessed angel to just _stop for a moment and talk_ … he’d been trying, with slowly growing success, for decades. And now? They _had_ talked. A lot. And drunk even more. Which was just as well. Archbishops or no archbishops, they would probably not have reached any sort of arrangement otherwise.

“Lyf’ was a – such a – a brigheigh f’low,” Aziraphale said, startling his unlikely companion. He had been enjoying the lengthy silence, just lying in the grass, beneath the crown of trees, safe from prying eyes. His newfound headache had been enjoying it, too.

“He wassa what?” he asked back sloppily.

“Bri’.”

“Wha’?”

“ _Bright_.”

“Oh, yes, yes, bright,” Crowley quickly agreed. It won him enough time to wade through the pleasant haze over his mind, and remember that the reason the angel had left the monastery, and stuck around long enough was that he agreed to drink to Lyfing’s memory. Smart move, not insulting that same memory a few hours later.

But still. Feeling beholden to men of the church. Not even drunkenness could excuse that. Sighing, Crowley decided to get rid of the remaining alcohol in his body (although the current one had been handling it remarkably well so far). Aziraphale soon followed sort, his nose and cheeks losing their comically strong red tint in a matter of seconds.

“What were we talking about?” the angel asked.

“Lyfing,” Crowley supplied.

“Oh, yes. Such a bright fellow. And a good man, truly.”

Oh, yes, it was all coming back to Crowley now. The long, – even for the peculiar sense of time immortal beings possessed – _very_ long rant about how the former Archbishop of Canterbury had been a remarkable person. Deciding for rebuilding after captivity, not letting it break his spirits, that sort of thing. Crowley wouldn’t know – he had never spoken to the man. He was more in his element when it came to the everyman’s affairs. 

Anyway, the angel had just realised he had lost a good friend in Lyfing about half a year after the Archbishop had died. Only a day after he had had his first meeting with Lyfing’s successor, Aethelnoth. Who, apparently, could not measure up to the previous Archbishop in any way. 

To Crowley, one church official was usually just like any other – they were far past the times of truly holy men. But these two, he did appreciate, at least a little, even now that he was sober. They had – inadvertently, of course, but still, they had – got the angel thinking about the _point_ of it all, just enough to actually pay attention to Crowley trying to tell him he had been doing the same. The two Archbishops might have been only the last pair of drops in a five-thousand-year-old ocean, but they were very peculiar little drops.

He ought to stick around and get to know at least the new fellow. Now that nobody was going to consider it his inevitable holy duty to vanquish the resident demon.


	4. War

_ 1\. March 1954 (N. S.), Rongelap atoll _

Pinned to a tree and inhaling death with every breath.

_ “I _ _never should have come here,”_ Crowley thought.

* * *

It had all started a few years before. Back then, Crowley had thought things could not have possibly been worse. But there was always, _always_ worse.

Back then, the problem had only been an argument. About a big pile of nothing. Just a misunderstanding, really. But he had wanted to play it safe. He had wanted _to stay_.

They had enough dead-eyed, stottin’ drunk conversations with Aziraphale after the newest great war to figure out that both sides considered it a failure. Some infuriating logical acrobatics were involved in their respective reasonings, but the point still stood. Both Heaven and Hell would pay more attention to their field agents and demand _more_ from them. It was going to be very difficult to work around those wishes and keep to the spirit of their own little Arrangement. And to be seen together, _not fighting_? That, they could not allow. Not for a while.

It had been Crowley who suggested they go their separate ways. Only for a few years, of course, and they would talk everything over afterwards, compensate for any imbalances, and so on… 

Crowley would never forget the haunted look on Aziraphale’s face – it had to be the mirror of the demon’s own expression. The angel’s current uncared-for, tall and gaunt corporation only served to drive that shared feeling home even more. The perfect picture of an upper-class young lady who had seen too much during the war. Only, no one would guess that this _too much_ involved supernatural elements – stark reminders of the power certain warriors of each side possessed. 

And since Aziraphale had asked Crowley to stay – well, not precisely _with_ her, but _near_ her – during the worst days of the war, they both ended up living through the Blitz. One of them roaming the streets with other volunteers, and the other “infiltrating the wartime government organisations and corrupting high-ranking military officers” in the unassuming role of a secretary. At least that was what Crowley’s reports had said.

On some nights, the bombs weren’t the worst of the dangers swooping down from the skies.

On those very same nights, elaborate traps were often set up by a nurse or a secretary whom no one seemed to remember after the fact. Silent, well-concealed traps that would never, ever fail. After all, the two of them had spent five thousand years practicing and perfecting the art of fighting occult or ethereal beings, before they moved on to do something more sensible in the past millennium. 

Neither of them ever mentioned that bombs should not fly back up into the safety of the cloud cover. Or that bombs should not bleed. As long as nobody died, everything was fair game. 

Now, though, that was over. The war had brought enough chaos with it to hide their activities, but the uneasy peace was too transparent. And so they said their goodbyes in quick, anxious words and hushed, regretful tones. Both of them were going to move away from the capital, only to have their reunion in the very same place after a decade of absence.

However, that long-awaited moment of relief never came. (It would never come now.) Crowley would have bet her entire record collection that after their final fallout, Aziraphale had to spend the rest of the day convincing the people of Chesterfield that they did not want to remember a certain furious badly dressed woman screaming at an Indian girl of roughly the same age.

If the blasted angel had only let her explain! But no, she had to go on monologuing, and pretending that the latest great war would be the last, that it had _changed_ people – of course Crowley had lost her patience as well! There was only so much Hell on Earth she could take in less than a dozen years.

“Did you seriously get this job only to convince them to rebuild with unsuitable materials? After everything that’s happened you-know-when?!” Aziraphale was demanding at the end of her completely unnecessary lecturing.

“Not _only_ to convince them,” Crowley replied flippantly. “They didn’t need much convincing anyway. Five more years in this economy, and they would have done it without me.”

“You can’t know that. They are capable of so much good-“

“And of the opposite, too. They have to be. _You_ said so.”

“Well, I wasn’t… Well, it doesn’t matter now. They have _changed_.”

“They will never change. Not after what they’ve done. You and I? Could never hope to match the scale of their wickedness.”

Perhaps it had not been the best thing to say. But to Crowley’s ears, it had rung true right then. (It would ring true now, too.)

“You and I…” Aziraphale echoed, staring at something above or behind Crowley’s head, “… there should not be a you and I.”

“What-… Aziraphale, what are you saying?” Crowley asked, a yet-unknown kind of panic gripping hold of her heart. And as a demon, it was in her job description to know _all_ kinds of panic.

“I cannot be seen not interfering with a demon’s plans that… Dear girl, this just goes too far.”

“Seriously?! Angel. Angel! You know I wouldn’t have – the building would have collapsed before anyone moved in!”

“I can’t know that.”

“Of course you c-“

“I think you should leave.”

“What?!”

“This just might not be the right environment for you.”

“Well, certainly not with such a sanctimonious bas-… blesssssed angel!” Crowley hissed, and stormed straight out of the city. 

(She would, of course, go back for her car later. But the angel didn’t have to know that.)


	5. Endings and Beginnings

_ 1\. March 1954, Rongelap atoll _

__

“No, admiral. You want to ignore the woman pinned to the tree. Incomparably more important issues are at stake now. First and foremost, why no one must be allowed to leave this island.”

Crowley tried to protest: of course people had to leave, of course the whole world had to know! However, she found she could _only_ hiss, and make no other sound. This time, it had nothing to do with fear or anger. Only power.

The same power that would not let _her_ leave, either.

This was a spy story all right, but one without a happy ending.

She knew what she had to do.

* * *

Reluctant as though she was to admit it, Crowley found there _might_ have been some truth to Aziraphale’s words. England could only remind him of all the ways people had managed to bring a tiny piece of Hell to Earth. It wasn’t the locals’ fault. Wasn’t exactly their enemy’s fault, either. It was just a fact. 

It may have been her best decision in a while to visit the States. (The Colonies, as Aziraphale would probably still sometimes slip into calling them.) _They_ had oceans vast enough to keep the true face of the war at a safe distance from them, and it showed in so many ways.

It was truly a New World to Crowley, who hadn’t been here in centuries. New people, new ideas (and what marvellous ideas they had!), and new distractions. Except on a few days a year. Especially in December.

Four months before, when winter had just started, bringing the first snow with it, Crowley had found herself sitting in a depressingly empty bar. There were only so many things she could tempt the owner with, and she had no desire to venture outside in these freezing temperatures. In short: she was utterly, inexcusably bored.

Until Eireen wondered in, cursing the cold to the seventh circle of Hell and back, thus adding half a dozen entirely new words to Crowley’s already impressive vocabulary. In a matter of hours, they ended up in Eireen’s flat, slightly drunk, very tired, and very comfortable in the warm bed they were sharing. In a matter of days, they decided it would be practical to move in together. In a matter of weeks, Crowley even told her the current alias she was using (Alana). Now that she thought about it, that should probably have come before all the _other_ stuff. 

They spent New Years’ Eve debating whether Eireen should go back to her relatives in Ireland. Crowley was, of course, against the idea; she had become a traitor to the old world with all the ease her reputation would have suggested. 

That same night, after her tipsy yet eloquent girlfriend had fallen asleep, Crowley summoned one of the books Eireen’s European relatives had sent her – it would hopefully be a good enough read to keep her mind off quite a few things she was anything but ready to face. Although she had never heard of the author before – some guy called Fleming – any book with _Casino_ in its title should be a satisfactory distraction for a demon.

The new year itself found both of them working: Eireen as an aspiring cook, and Crowley as the problematic customer who got the few meanest rivals she had, fired (effective immediately). And of course, in her free time, she was happily abusing supernatural means of travel and camouflage, doing everything in her power to find her own spy story.

* * *

And now here she was, at the very end of it.

On a stupid beach.

Where everyone was dying.

Even her.


	6. Fallout

_ 29\. December 1953 (N. S.), New York _

__

Eireen’s voice.

“Crowley, dear-“

“Don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Fine. Alana, you little shit. You’ve been drinking for three days straight. Now get off my couch and get rid of the wine bottles,” Eireen demanded.

“Don’ hav’ t’ get up f’r that,” Crowley mumbled petulantly, miracling the mostly empty containers away.

“Holy crap!” Eireen cried out.

“G’ss ‘gain.”

“What?”

“’sssss ag’n.”

“What?!”

“Guesssss again!” Crowley hissed, her frustration doubled by the effect of all the alcohol abruptly leaving her system. The accompanying flash in her bright yellow eyes was enough to spur her partner into action. Even if the action was running away.

* * *

Here, there was no escape. Not with the acidic burn of a vaguely holy blade keeping the wound open. Not when the most terrifying enemy she’d ever had to face was standing a mere two steps in front of her, creating military secrets with the ease of a confident winner.

* * *

To her credit, Eireen came back after a few hours. Armed with everything she could think of, ranging from freaking _garlic_ through a rosary, a cross, and a phial of low-grade holy water, to an old, battered, definitely unsafe handgun. The sight made Crowley erupt in hysteric bursts of laughter.

“Well, you can go right back to Hell, making fun of me like that! What else was I supposed to do?!” Eireen shrieked, gesturing wildly enough to spill all the holy water on the walls and the floor. Perfect.

“Not confuse me with a vampire, for starters,” Crowley suggested helpfully. 

“None of these can hurt you, can they?” Eireen asked, her voice carefully kept low this time.

“How did you figure it out?”

“You’re not afraid,” she admitted.

“Neither are you,” Crowley pointed out. 

“I’ve been living with you long enough to… well, anything, really. So… Alana… um, Crowley… what the hell?”

“Sit down and let’s have a drink.”

* * * 

“What the hell are you doing?” Crowley forced out over the maddening burn of holiness. Although to the human’s ears, it would only be hissing, the _other_ was sure to understand.

“Who is she?” the admiral asked, throwing uneasy glances at the yellow-eyed, severely bleeding Indian girl he wished he could ignore.

“Nobody. Just do as you have been told, and you will not have to worry about her existence ever again,” the angel promised, his voice simmering with despise and repulsion beneath the calm façade.

“Let His will be done,” the soldier said morosely, before he bowed his head and walked away.

“And now, Serpent,” the angel said, turning to face the wriggling demon, “may you find consolation in my eternal appreciation of the fact that your last wish will have been for knowledge.”

* * *

Driving towards the capital after all the rival wannabe-cooks had been chased away, Crowley was still thinking of that night. Of how it ended. Of Eireen’s face, so old all of a sudden, but kinder than she had ever seen any angel appear.

“You’re in a rut. I’ve been there, too, although you probably don’t want to hear that. Anyway. You can’t just _stop_. Well, I guess, technically, _you_ can… But you shouldn’t. Go and do something. Find something new – something to do until it gets better. Because it _will_ get better, I promise you. I won’t rest until it does.”

Driving away from the capital, she thought maybe Eireen was right. She had come to this continent to find interesting new things. She would go even further to chase them. Maybe she could even take credit for the whole secret bomb test she’d just heard about. She would just have to be there – easy to do – and she wouldn’t even have to intervene. Besides, it wasn’t like they were going to kill anyone. It was all just to show off their shiny new toys. The only reason Crowley was flying over the Pacific Ocean right now was to make sure she hadn’t been made a fool of. To see if humans have indeed unlocked a new power comparable to holy wrath. Besides, she would be safe – this new power, in spite of the comparison, had nothing to do with holiness. And before ’44, she had used to love fireworks. Maybe this would make her grow to love them again.


	7. Casualties

_ 1\. March 1954 (N. S.), near Rongelap atoll _

While technically it wasn’t the first hydrogen bomb detonation in the history of the world, it was still a big enough event. The sheer size and force of the explosion was far beyond anything Crowley had ever seen on Earth – and she had given a good long look to nearly all things worth seeing. The expanding cloud spoke of ingenuity and enormous effort. A magnificent, useless spectacle. Because this weapon? This would never be used. Every species on this planet had more of a survival instinct than that, and Crowley should know. So even humans had to have it. Even they would not unleash such destruction. Not even if both Heaven and Hell wanted them to. The entire race wasn’t made up of madmen.

At that point, Crowley lost her train of thought, as she became preoccupied inelegantly spitting out strands of long black hair she had almost swallowed. The wind was definitely picking up.

_ “Time for the demonic audience to leave,” _ she thought. _“Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, you’ve put on an awe-inspiring show of your stupidest ideas today.”_

With that, she spun around, rose into the air…

… and noticed the other atolls. In the perfect position for this strange new wind to rain radioactive fallout down on them. She could vaguely hear alarms going off in the military shelter… but still. She would never hear the end of it is she didn’t do something. Neither from Hell, nor from the blasted angel. If she would ever even talk to her again.

* * *

Not that existing long enough to see Aziraphale again appeared to be in the cards anymore. Crowley had blessed herself a million times since, for not immediately assuming heavenly interference into the outcome of this secret military project. Of every secret military project in the history of mankind, really.

Barely had she landed on Rongelap atoll, she found herself pinned to a sturdier tree by a heavenly sword. The blade had carefully avoided every vital part of her corporation, but it burned her like acid and weakened her significantly. It wasn’t imbued with enough holy power to annihilate demons, but the weapon was still poisonous enough for the fallout to start affecting her. So really, Crowley’s only options at this point were a slow, drawn-out discorporation via radiation sickness… or getting permanently killed by none other than the Keeper of Secrets: the Archangel Raziel himself.

Pessimism wasn’t only in Crowley’s job description; it was in her nature. So really, she could only believe in the second outcome. On the other hand, she had learned a few tricks from humanity. For example, doing really, _really_ stupid things.

“Why are you doing this?!” she kept demanding the only way she was allowed: hissing.

Because the most utterly blood-freezing part couldn’t have been the prospect of imminent death (temporary or otherwise). Not even facing one of the most horrifying members of the Heavenly Host – oh, no. The most gut-wrenchingly terrifying part had to be the Archangel’s knowledge. The mystical knowledge that only he possessed, and that apparently enabled him to control, confine and coerce another occult being’s very essence. From the moment he had touched her – running her through with the sword – Crowley couldn’t hide her wings or change shape… and yet still, she had less of accent in hisses now than when she had been in the form of an actual snake.

Thank Go-… Sa-… Someone, Raziel found his continued defiance _amusing_.

“Very well, vile little demon. I should have anticipated your thirst for knowledge. It would be a commendable quality, really, if only you weren’t irredeemably diseased scum,” he offered with a smile.

_ “Sanctimonious bastards, the lot of them,” _ Crowley thought irritably. 

“But you should not be so surprised, either. Even you have to know my true calling, Serpent,” Raziel droned on. Crowley could have said the sound of his voice made her flinch and squirm – yet that wasn’t entirely true. The dripping condescension didn’t do him any favours, though. “This moment – these days – will go down in history. Not as the leap they think they have made in conquering nature – what a laughable idea. No, little Serpent. I am here to teach them what they really need to learn: the consequences. They will have to see the full extent of the torture their technology brings. They will be made to face the irremediable suffering of those they have poisoned with radiation. By Heaven’s decree, I will not allow them to save these people – because on the whole, humans cannot save themselves, not if they continue down this path. And it is not yet time for them to end. It would not be by our edict, and so they must not destroy themselves before the day anointed for the Apocalypse.”

Crowley… couldn’t really believe her ears. Not because the plan she’d been told of was so unlike the usual way of thinking Above. (It wasn’t.) But because _her own plan_ had actually worked. What would be a spy story, after all, without a monologuing villain?

Crowley let out a short, slightly unhinged laugh (she had to admit, the hissing sort of cackle sounded appropriately unsettling). Without giving her enemy even a moment to react, she utilised the full range of motion she had built up twisting and squirming all this time…

… and let the blade slice her hammering heart in two.


	8. After Dark

_ 3\. November 1956 (N. S.), an unusually dusty bookshop in Soho _

A sleek young man was sitting on the only chair not covered entirely by books. He nervously pulled on his off-white shirt from time to time, and twiddled his thumbs in an unnatural staccato of clumsy moves. Well after twilight had fallen on his nigh-unblinking, sunglass-shielded stare, the front door finally opened to admit a middle-aged secretary carrying – surprise – another stack of ancient-looking volumes.

“Excuse me, Sir,” she said, substituting any expected fear of a mysterious, dark-haired intruder with irritation, “but this bookshop and the adjoining flat are my property, and however hard I try, I cannot seem to recall giving you permission to enter.”

“It’s me.”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure it is. In the same vein as I am me. Do you perhaps wish to continue your philosophical discussions with the police?”

“Angel, it’sss me.”

“… Crowley?”

Silence fell upon the stuffy room again. The unusually subdued and quiet demon in the centre felt just as uncomfortable in his skin as he had when it had been brand new. (To be fair, that was only a few days prior to his visit to his old counterpart.) 

“You’ve… changed,” Aziraphale said eventually. They both had more to learn about humans and their sometimes baffling conversational skills, apparently.

“ _You_ haven’t,” Crowley pointed out completely unnecessarily. But then, “I’m glad.”

“Uh, what…? Dear gi-… boy, what on earth do you mean?”

“I’m glad you haven’t changed,” Crowley repeated. He went on much more quietly, “Like I. Er. Had to.“

„Oh. Oh, uh… do you… do you want to talk about it?” the angel offered. The gesture seemed honest enough, and it was a very welcome respite from what Crowley’s existence had been like in the previous years.

“No, but we have to,” he decided. “In the spirit of our Arrangement and all.”

“Uh, yes, about that… I… my dear, I might have been too quick to judge your plans. Too… harsh in that judgement.”

“You were a right bastard.”

“There’s no need to-… ah, well, I suppose I was.”

“Right back at you.”

“Drink?”

“Yes. All the wine your shelves can hold.”

“But dear boy, the books-“

“Just pulling your leg, angel.”

* * *

After several barrels of the finest wines known to men had been miracled into existence, emptied, and finally rendered non-existent again, the small back room was home to three things: two utterly spent men-shaped beings, and their horrible, horrible drunken smell.

They _could_ be happy drunks. If they put some effort into it. This, right then? Was not one of those occasions. Especially not after Crowley had shared every last blessed detail of his short-lived career as a self-appointed spy. Since he felt he far more than deserved a little whining (or even a lot) he finally did what he had never let himself do: think – and talk – about the tormenting, devastating _silence_ of it all. How death was always lonely and eerily quiet, even if it lasted only for a moment. How Hell was no better – in spite of the wails of the tortured souls. How nothing had been much better than the maddening stillness, ever since he had begun to saunter, and the cosmos shattered, the melody cut off…

Aziraphale – wisely – promised to never speak of this night again, and brought out his own wings to brush them along Crowley’s. Intoxicated as they were, neither of them questioned the gesture. Moreover, they found it quite pleasant. (If they would refuse to speak of this, too, that was an entirely different question.)

* * *

Morning found them lying next to one another, pretending they could see long-since shifted constellations on the mouldy ceiling. No feathers were to be seen anywhere, and no wine was to be found, either. Only the nice, familiar scent of ancient tomes (of a bibliophile angel), and two very deceitfully human, but very grounding heartbeats lingered, filling the otherwise unwelcoming environment. It was something Crowley found he had been looking forward to, even if it wasn’t how he had imagined every minor detail. His wild dreams of earthly freedom had, for starters, included a soft and warm bed. And the heart rate he had grown used to over nearly two centuries, not the slightly too slow, always annoyingly off-beat one he had now. His fantasies had definitely included a drunken night that would be stretched into an entire week… However, he was not going to get that, either. He could hear – and wasn’t it strange how even this voice sounded just the tiniest bit too high – the angel’s breathing gradually speed up, betraying her growing anxiety over some moral dilemma. Crowley had come to know that sound well. And this time, he could guess the reason.

“I know about the crisis,” he said morosely. 

“You do?” Aziraphale asked back in wonder. Sitting up already. So much for any short respite.

“It’s about the only reason I didn’t have to wait decades for a new corporation.”

“So…”

“You want to be there. Where the action is.”

“I have a moral obligation to-“

“You can just tell me. I miss the Red Sea too, you know. Plus, they will be expecting a report Below.”

“I do miss the Red Sea,” Aziraphale nodded with a strange smile on her face, and a faint rustle of currently incorporeal wings. “The good old days.”

“Yeah,” Crowley sighed. Without any further excuse, he wouldn’t say what was really going through his head. Not after all the embarrassing confessions that he’d be lucky to ever forget, let alone live down. 

“I don’t miss our fighting, though,” Aziraphale said – as if reading his mind.

“We might have to do some,” Crowley warned her, a good deal of obligatory pessimism keeping his voice low.

“Choreography,” the angel replied dismissively. “It’s much easier than the gavotte, I can assure you.”

“You _would_ say that.” Crowley laughed. He could barely wait to just be _done_ with the newest crisis humans managed to cook up. They had potentially very pleasant lives to come back to.


	9. After the Midnight Hour

_ 27 August 1990 (N. S.), a bedroom in Mayfair, London, eternally clean and perfect _

__

__

_ “Back. Home.” _

Aziraphale noisily turned the page, and the sleepy thoughts finally erupted into coherence in Crowley’s reluctant mind.

_ “We are home.” _

It was, of course, the specific location he was thinking of. Inasmuch as it was on Earth, and near the only angel who was enough of a bastard to be worth liking.

He held his angel’s hand more tightly, and listened to the other’s contented heartbeat, unable to remember a moment when any of this could have felt off in any way. The rhythm was soothing, the pitch was perfect, and the moment had the intriguing potential to last forever – now that the world had not ended.

“You dozed off for a few hours, dear,” said Aziraphale, just the tiniest bit distracted from his book. Just enough to note his companion had woken up.

“Never hurts to practice some of the easier vices.” Crowley shrugged.

“I thought you liked this book?” Aziraphale half-asked.

“Angel. I could just tell the whole thing by heart.”

“Well, what are you waiting for?”

* * *

“Why are we not heading for the bookshop, again?” Crowley had asked late in the afternoon. “It’s much closer.”

“I would keep thinking about the new additions,” Aziraphale admitted. “And, anyway, we barely ever visit your place. Why is that?”

“ _Maybe_ because Hell can contact me there anytime?” Crowley nearly snapped. Acidic sarcasm was only marginally better, he found.

“ _Heaven_ could contact _me_ ,” the angel pointed out. 

“Touché.” Crowley sighed. “But I might end up moving.”

“How come?” Aziraphale inquired. It was… honestly, it was a very human thing to do. And he sounded… just so happy. Nearly as relieved as Crowley himself. Even more amusing was the fact that the blessed angel just seemed to be _beaming_ , projecting all of this into the world, practically infecting any human that passed them by on the eternally busy streets. Crowley hadn’t seen such an occurrence since before the Plagues. And he had to admit, this contagious joy was affecting him, too. Because it never should have been this easy to utter what he had to say.

“I have demon remains to clean up from my floor.”

The nonchalance of that statement gave the angel a start.

“You could just… um… miracle it away?” he suggested somewhat hesitantly.

“And who’s the one always saying it wouldn’t be the same…?”

“That, ah… that would be me. I’m sorry, dear. Do you just want to go to the bookshop instead? There might be something in there I never would have thought to hunt down.”

“Nah… I want to show you something anyway,” Crowley decided, a new idea humming in his mind. “We can just leave after that.”

* * *

Of course they did _not_ leave anytime soon. Good wine and good company could make one forget things far worse than a quiet pile of ashes. Especially when said company managed to ask completely unexpected questions, such as…

“You have a bed I could use, don’t you, dear boy?”

Crowley wasn’t sure if it was possible for him to choke on something as unholy as a re-used teabag in a cold black mug. The angel certainly made him try his best, though.

* * *

As it turned out, nearly losing all – supposedly meaningless – earthly delights had really changed some things for both of them.

“Virtue might be ever-vigilant,” Aziraphale said, after his counterpart’s survival became sure enough, “but you have told me such compelling things about sleep. Would you help me try?”

Aneurisms certainly couldn’t kill a demon, and Crowley should know – he had spent the past several millennia together with probably the most annoying angel Heaven had to offer.

* * *

Aziraphale proved to be very bad at sleeping. Too excited for the experience, probably. Asking too many questions? Definitely.

How fortunate that he proved to be exceptional in _something else_.

* * *

“I thought you liked this book?” Aziraphale half-asked.

“Angel. I could just tell the whole thing by heart.”

“Well, what are you waiting for?”

A long moment passed in complete silence and stillness. (It wasn’t terribly uncomfortable, for once.) Then Crowley took the dog-eared first edition from his companion’s hands, and carefully placed it on the bedside table. He expertly ignored Aziraphale’s amused sniggers, and closed his eyes to focus on the scene.

"The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning,” Crowley recited. “Then the soul erosion produced by high gambling — a compost of greed and fear and nervous tension — becomes unbearable and the senses awake and revolt from it…"


	10. Immunity

_ 25 August 2020 (N. S.), Canterbury _

For once, Aziraphale was fast asleep.

All right, a selection of old liquors might have had something to do with it, but that was hardly the point.

The point was rather the infuriating silence. It would have made Crowley scream, if not for the crickets. Thank Sa-… Go-…? Someone? For the little buggers.

These past few decades must have been the highlight of Crowley’s existence, but he did not get lost in their enjoyment – not enough to forget how they had got here. How improperly un-demonic of him. The big question was… was his angel thinking the same way? Did it matter to him, even a little? Or at all? 

_ “Just think, all right? Think logically,” _ Crowley told himself in his thoughts. He looked up to she sky – remembering half-imagined constellations of mould on a far-away ceiling – but the Universe remained stubbornly quiet. Stars were no help, humans were no help, and Aziraphale – well, he was certainly no help.

Less than three dozen year prior, the world had almost ended. It had served as a catalyst that put an end to the slow and messy dance that had been Aziraphale and Crowley orbiting one another. They needed some time to readjust their trajectories, and it took a series of spontaneous, bursty encounters until they finally cemented their new and improved relationship. Kind of like the Earth and its Moon, according to humans and their strange science. (Honestly, Crowley could not remember anymore what his elders had once told him about the topic. He quite liked the human theory, anyway.)

Because of this gradual and incalculable drift, they had never felt the need to point at a date and claim it was when they took a start – much like they didn’t celebrate birthdays, either. It mattered very little to them what numbers they ended up conjuring on documents meant to help them blend in among the people of ever-changing nations and customs.

But this, Crowley had realised with something akin to dread, this could be big. Important. Well over a millennium passed since one of them had last managed to discorporate the other. And almost exactly one thousand years since they had mutually agreed to stop trying. 

Ten entire centuries.

About a sixth of their whole existence.

That had to mean something, right?

Crowley certainly felt like it did.

Then again, the concept of anniversaries was non-existent both Above and Below. It was purely the product of creatures of clay cursed with ephemeral lifespan, unable to ever fully break out of the servitude that Time imposed upon them. In Heaven, time was an insignificant pariah. In Hell… it was always too late anyway.

But Aziraphale and Crowley – they lived on Earth. And they intended to stay.

So they should celebrate, shouldn’t they?

_ “But what if the Angel doesn’t want to?” _ Crowley asked himself for the millionth time since the beginning of the year. It was the big question he always returned to. The one he seemed to be unable to answer.

And the stars were no help. Humans’ opinions carried little weight in such an unusual case of a couple of immortal man-shaped beings living among them. And he couldn’t very well ask Aziraphale. Because, even Crowley knew, this should be obvious. And if the angel _did_ want to celebrate the anniversary of their Arrangement, he would surely find the question hurtful. It would catapult him right back into his old tirades, claiming that as a demon, Crowley couldn’t properly understand, let alone feel love. 

Worse still, what if it didn’t matter to him? What if any sentimental mention of anniversaries would drive him away?

Everything would be over, either way. 

Crowley was at the end of his wit. He had tried everything he could think of to get the information out of his companion. He slipped sappy romance novels on top of Aziraphale’s endless piled of books. He created just enough drama in their neighbours’ relationships for the angel to notice the shouting and the loud episodes of appeasement. He had taken Aziraphale to the most obvious romantic movie he could find (under the guise of introducing the angel to the wonders of 4D cinema). They had talked more about every and any single love-related thing than anytime before. But somehow, by some supremely annoying miracle, Aziraphale managed not to let anything _actually useful_ slip over the course of eight long months. As if the blasted angel had built up such a tolerance to Crowley’s every usual tactic that his demonic charm could be declared non-existent.

For Someone’s sake, Crowley even brought him to the very city they had forged the Arrangement in! On the exact anniversary of the Armageddidnt! This had to have been on-the-nose enough, hadn’t it?

Apparently not. 

Blessed angels and their blessed inscrutable radiant smiles.


	11. With a Little Help From My Friends

_ 1 September 2020 (N. S.), a little less tidy and perfect bedroom, Mayfair, London _

__

__

Crowley had just checked his mail and retreated to his now somehow perpetually dust-scented yet nigh-immaculate bedroom to think. However, the noises made by a very ineffectual postman, and eventually some letter sliding through the slit of the front door and crashing to the floor startled him out of his reverie. He was going to just grab the annoying latecomer pieces of paper, and incinerate them with a thought – but the sight of the big red envelope with gothic style lettering stopped him. As carefully as he just could, he tore it open with burning curiosity.

__

_ “Hi Crowley, _

_ good, apparently you thought I was my ancestor, writing to you. Do Not Stop Reading. _

_ I’ll be short: thanks for the anniversary wishes. NOW DON’T YOU DARE FORGET YOURS. _

_ Witching you well, _

_ Anathema” _

On the one hand, her husband’s sense of humour was clearly wearing down on her, Crowley thought to himself with a sigh. On the other hand, Agnes might have known the future scarily well, but her descendant’s newfound talent for catching people’s trails of thought and shepherding them to exactly where she wanted said people’s minds was equally unsettling.

As if this hadn’t been enough, a moment later, Crowley’s newest watch – the sleekest and smartest such device ever made, the terrified salesman had assured him – went off signalling a new message, leaving a crumpled letter and an exasperated demon in its wake. It read:

__

_ From: Princes of the Universe (Adam Had Insisted) _

_ To: Snake Uncle _

_ Message: _

_ Hey Crowley, _

_ want me to help you get a big enough cake for a thousand candles? Magic candles that can only be blown out with wings? Wensley says that’s childish and dumb (perfect), but Brian promised to have the fire squad ready. Not that you’d really need them, eh? _

_ But seriously. Give us a ring if you need help with the surprise party. We do this sort of thing all the time, just, you know, with smaller numbers. _

_ Happy Arrangement-sary, _

_ Us _

_ PS: Pepper wants me to tell you she will pluck you like a thanksgiving turkey if you mess this up. Or if you don’t send us pictures within a year. No rush, though. _

Well, _technically_ , these people weren’t simple humans. Certainly not the average human. And they knew enough to know when the Arrangement had come to be (though the word Arrangementsary would never be one that Crowley could be convinced to use). And they _all_ seemed to be expecting a celebration.

And, if he was entirely honest with himself (although demons were probably not supposed to do even that), Crowley kind of… just the tiniest bit… wanted one.

He wanted surprises. He wanted to make a big deal out of a simple pattern of dates.

He wanted to give his angel the first edition of _Casino Royale_ that they had read together just after Armageddidnt. 

… but that wasn’t quite big enough of a fuss, was it now?


	12. Legacy of the Fallen

_ 21 July 939 BC (O. S.), Solomon’s Reading Chamber _

Hiding in the second secret exit corridor might have been one of the worst ideas Crowley had ever had. To his defence, he had been expecting Aziraphale to come and nose through the King’s secret collection – and definitely not the man himself to turn up. As a general rule, Crowley did not like to mess with humans who knew how to see through most of the simpler occult tricks, and how to bind demons. So the best he could come up with on the spot was to hide.

And later, he would be overjoyed by this inelegant decision. It might very well have saved his skin. 

Not that this made the flash of heavenly light through the entire palace (the entire city?) any less painful, or the following series of crashes, explosions, and tormented screams any less terrifying. 

_ “Thank Go-… Sa-… Somebody for the magical interference,” _ Crowley thought, making a quick mental count of the scrolls scattered throughout the shaking room. The magical instructions and the attempts to construct new spells, scribbled over each of them, were enough to conceal his own occult signature. A Duke would have stuck out like a sore thumb, but Crowley was relatively safe as long as he stuck close to the books. (Aziraphale would find this extremely humorous, he was sure.)

Someone else _was_ sticking out: a bright, yet unidentifiable angelic presence. The path of general chaos and destruction seemed to follow its clattering footsteps, and it was clearly headed for the reading chamber. 

Solomon had barely had time to put away his scroll and draw his sword by the time the intruder forced their way into the room. A large chunk of wall simply evaporated around the seething angel, and the very vaguely man-shaped creature immediately pinned the enraged King to the wall with a well-aimed thought.

Crowley did not dare to draw a single breath after that. (Although he technically didn’t need to, it was hard to give up on such a long-standing habit.) He thought: that temple for Milcom might have been too much. But he had only mentioned the idea to the King’s wife, he had never thought it would actually get built, least of all that it would be so enormous, ornate… 

… and such a grave offense in Heaven’s eyes.

“Where is it, you despicable little maggot?!” the angel demanded, their shape enveloped in flames as they spoke. The longer Crowley looked, the more familiar that fire seemed, though…

“Be gone, foul creature!” Solomon yelled at the angel – which was definitely the wrong thing to say. It was the way a demon would be addressed, not an ang-…

_ “Oh. He’s not. An angel anymore,” _ Crowley finally realised. Now that he knew what it really was, he could look past the hungry flames of Hell, and identify the being they were trying to consume.

“Silence, sinner! You have betrayed your Lord, and you are about to plunge your kin into a new era of darkness, yet you dare make demands even now?! I should strike you down where you stand!” the falling angel screamed at the proud King. “You will not stop me,” he continued more quietly. 

Crowley did not miss the occasional wince even the powerful creature couldn’t suppress. He wasn’t surprised: he knew the process all too well.

“I am Rahab, mine are the oceans, mine was the Book to save from their depths, and mine is the power to take it away again,” the intruder proclaimed. It was, of course, a half-truth at best. Otherwise, he could have appeared with his full might and his very essence intact.

“I will take back the _Sefer Raziel HaMalakh_ ; your kind is unworthy and will forever remain undeserving of such gifts. I will take the Book or we will all be destroyed.”

As if to give emphasis to Rahab’s words, the building started shaking again, even more violently than before. At this point, all Crowley wanted to do was scream, since nothing but the imminent arrival of an exceptionally powerful group of angels could cause this specific pattern of ethereal vibrations. 

Rahab might have been aware of this, or spitting out one threat after the other might have just made him feel better during the tormenting fall – it mattered very little. Because he surely had no idea just how stubborn any human had to be to keep even the most meaningless position of power. And the King? Would never tell him. Never let the source of his magical knowledge be taken.

“We shall perish, then,” Solomon answered the challenge. Either he did not care about death, or he still trusted Heaven’s mercy…

… which Crowley did not.

Timed to the rhythm of the next minor earthquake, he shook a piece of the ceiling loose, and made it crash the chest surrounded by the holiest emanation. Rahab would need time to relearn how to make sense of such stimuli, but Crowley already had hones his demonic senses to perfection when it came to various manifestations of holy dangers on Earth.

As he had hoped, Rahab whirled around, noticed the glimmering volume he had come for, and knocked the useless king unconscious. He muttered a silent incantation, and then he lunged for the book – which, interestingly, did not burn him. In a few moments, he was gone – as was the trembling of earth, walls and sky caused by extreme inter-realm pressure. Crowley remained alone in the half-demolished chamber, and decided that even if he never saw Solomon again, it would be aeons too soon.


	13. Why Did It Have To Be Sea Beasts?

_ 12 September 2020 (N. S.), a decidedly messy and untidy flat in Mayfair, London _

“I know, said the proud idiot, I’ll track down a demonic angel I have last seen three thousand years ago! How hard could it be?!” Crowley fumed, fighting the ever stronger urge to just start hitting his head with the nearest tome. He had _tomes_ now, for Someone’s sake! Actual, real-life old and dusty tomes stolen from jealous collectors all over the world. Tomes. In his flat.

He was turning into Aziraphale.

If he was going to start wearing tartan, too, he would just have to ask his Venus’ flytrap to swallow him whole.

* * *

Two more days of labouring over books finally brought some results. More precisely, covering them with reports of strange occurrences printed from the depths of the internet did.

With the help of the craziest theories surrounding vanished or sunken ships as well as crashed planes, Crowley managed to determine that there were only a dozen places Rahab could be hiding. And where he was, there the Book had to be, too. The First Edition to begin all first editions. The Book of Secrets. The real deal, too, not just a distortion of it, put together by generations upon generations of devoted humans. Not a fragment of the whole, not based on Solomon’s faulty and fading memories of it. The actual Book that had been written and first brought to Earth by the Archangel Raziel himself.

If Aziraphale spent days immersed in the Nice and Accurate Prophecies, _this_ book would keep him pinned to his chair for years to come. (Crowley already felt somewhat jealous. But the look on his angel’s face would _so_ be worth it.)

* * *

Later that evening, he called the angel. Unsure as to when he could return and deal with the preparations for the big day, he thought it best to settle some things well in advance.

“Yes, Crowley?” Aziraphale’s vibrant voice asked from the other end of the line.

“You… actually checked the caller-ID,” Crowley said lamely. To his defence, this was an entirely new development. His feather-brained counterpart… was just that. Scatter-brained enough to always forget to take a short look at the screen, no matter how many times Crowley had tried to explain the benefits.

“You might have noticed that I can, indeed, read,” the angel teased light-heartedly.

“Still not a fan of audiobooks?” Crowley shot back with a grin. Now, that would be an idea: the secrets of the universe, an unabridged recording…

“Don’t even start, you vile old serpent.”

“All right, love, not this time. Listen, there is something I wanted to ask…”

“Yes, my dear?”

“Aremphfreeonthtwfth-” Crowley rushed through the question with a wholly knew and unavoidable lump in his throat.

“What?!”

“I sssaid… Are you free on the twelfth of December?”

“Well, I… of course, dear boy. But why do you ask?”

“I’m… I sort of have to go out of town for a while. I… you know, I wanted to make sure we could meet up afterwards,” Crowley said. _“Real smooth,”_ he quietly scolded himself. _“Are you even a demon that you can barely put together a decent lie?!”_

“Oh. Is it… did they message you from Below?” Aziraphale asked worriedly.

“No, no, it’s… something personal.”

“So that’s all right, then,” the angel concluded. He suddenly sounded very cheerful. “I myself am quite busy at the moment, too. This actually came at the perfect time,” he went on, growing ever more chipper.

“All right…” Crowley said, hoping beyond hope that the uncertainty in his voice wasn’t as tangible as he thought it was. “See you on the twelfth, then. Let’s say… St James’ Park. At eight.”

“Sounds lovely, dear boy.”

“Er… good. See you around, angel.”

“Goodbye, Crowley.”

* * * 

Early next morning, Crowley took off from the rooftop with growing unease. Actually facing Rahab in his sea beast form was not something Eden’s crafty but, comparatively speaking, tiny serpent was looking forward to. And it felt potentially pointless after the last phone call with his angel. Aziraphale had definitely not realised the importance of the date for their next meeting. And he didn’t seem to mind nearly two months of his counterpart’s absence, either? 

However, Crowley’s newly hatched optimism managed to persevere. He must have been reading too much into the distracted words of his angel. Surely, at one point he would remember what had happened exactly a thousand years before. Surely, he would want to make the date even more memorable. An Antichrist, a witch and a demon couldn’t _all_ be wrong.


	14. A. J. Crowley and the Raiders of the Lost Book

  1. _December 2020 (N.S.), Ma-no Umi (Sea of the Devil)_



Nearly two months, over three dozen failures, and a handful of deep-sea traps later, Crowley thought he should just give up. Mountain-sized or not, apparently the sea beast he was looking for had hidden itself so well that it could have as well been non-existent. And time was nearly up. 

“All right, just one more trip,” he told his exhausted reflection. Gone was the optimistic, well-groomed demon with the perpetual nervous energy. And the decidedly un-demonic optimism. Crowley had gift-wrapped his first treasured Bond book over a month before, as his quest continued to be unsuccessful. He briefly considered contacting Adam, then, just to ask if he had encountered any spare occult sea creatures when he nearly ended the world at the ripe old age of eleven. He quickly dismissed the idea, though, once he said the question out loud as practice. _“Armageddidnt, and let’s just leave it at that,”_ he had thought to himself.

So now it was the long-awaited day of the anniversary, and he was flying towards Japan to look for Rahab in one final potential hiding place. Specifically, towards the country’s Southern coast, where a patch of water had carved out the name of “Dragon’s Triangle” or “Devil’s Sea” for itself, mainly by gobbling up boats and planes, as well as probably causing some hallucinations. 

Once he arrived within seeing distance of Miyake Island, Crowley dropped into the water, and willed himself to sink to the bottom of the seabed – only to regret his every choice immediately.

Why, oh why had he ever been so stupid as to _want_ to find a sea monster a hundred times his own size? And then he hadn’t even considered power relations yet. The volcanic island in the distance appeared decidedly tiny compared to Rahab’s enormous beastly form.

And worse still: the sea monster was sleeping right in front of the entrance to an underwater cave, which had a faint, but decidedly holy aura to it. Which meant that Crowley was definitely in the right place. Well, at least _near_ the right place. He would still have to walk around the enormous creature. Without disturbing its uneasy sleep, if he wanted to survive this adventure.

_ “Quiet. Just be quiet. Just keep everything quiet. Just. Don’t. Wake. Him. Up.” _

The reminder was completely unnecessary, yet Crowley’s mind helpfully kept replaying it with every awkward and painfully slow tiptoeing step he took. The human body was decidedly not made for stealthy movement – not underwater, at least. He would have much preferred to still be a much smaller and far less noticeable serpent… but changing forms was currently somewhere beyond the further edge of impossible.

A deep rumbling noise reminded him what exactly he was trying to leave behind, and he quickened his steps on the slippery cover of algae over the ground. A moment later, he could have screamed-

_ (“Shut up, shut up, shut up, don’t make a sound!”) _

\- when a distant shipwreck began a blood-freezingly loud, creaking descent from its unsteady resting place. The rumbling started up again, the beast sounding less sleepy and much angrier this time around. Subtlety be blessed, Crowley kicked himself off the rocks of the seabed, and swam towards the cavern as fast as he could. 

Although he hadn’t used his wings underwater in centuries, they still carried him with more speed than he had hoped for: he overshot the entrance to the cave entirely, and got caught up in a current that definitely should not have been there. It carried him along spiky, serpentine corridors, throwing him against hard walls and pushing him up and down impossibly long shafts, all of it with the swiftness of a misaligned comet falling into the Sun…

… only to spit him out into a large, _dry_ chamber underneath a dome of water.

At first, he did not dare to move. 

_ “Is he awake? Is he… does he know?” _

Apparently though, no one knew that he had found the place he had been looking for. (Or the place had found him. Semantics.)

The desert-dry and void-quiet chamber was still enough to keep him unnerved.

_ “Best get this over with.” _

He stood up on the eerily lifeless ground, took care of his bruises with a few miracles, and hid his wings – there wouldn’t have been much use for them down _wherever on Earth this was_. Aside from the water-dome on top, the chamber possessed only one exit: a hole barely tall enough for a man (or man-shaped creature in this case) to go through without constantly bumping their head into the artificially smooth ceiling. Crowley could barely wait to reach the end of the claustrophobic corridor. To him, such a structure was very suspect: why would such a simple (albeit uncomfortable) path lead to such unspeakable treasure? With every step he expected to find himself in the mouth of a trap.

However, the tunnel simply opened into a much wider corridor, which, again, led straight ahead into impenetrable darkness. And steeply down. Not that a demon would not be used to that. After the stormy entry, this part was almost enjoyable.

_ “Just like Indiana Jones,” _ Crowley thought to himself proudly. Only, this artefact would be beyond the wildest dreams of any human professor of archaeology, fictional or otherwise.

Barely had Crowley reached that conclusion, he tripped over something, and fell flat on his face. As the ground and the walls of the tunnel both started rumbling, he forgot all about the sound of a wire snapping that his ears had only just been able to catch, and scrambled to his feet. Looking for the source of the vibrations, he whirled around just in time to see a section of the ceiling open up and slide entirely out of view, letting a giant boulder fall into the now very understandably inclined corridor.

_ “Just like Indiana Jones,” _ he thought bitterly, as he turned away from the ominous spectacle, and started to run.


	15. A. J. Crowley and the Lost Crusade

_ 12\. December 2020 (N.S.), Ma-no Umi (Sea of the Devil) _

Possibly the happiest moment of Crowley’s recent existence was the one in which he leapt into the chamber at the end of the corridor, leaving the deathly boulder behind. Even if in the very next second, that same boulder blocked the exit.

And in inhuman growl shook the cavern.

Rahab was definitely awake.

Crowley shivered on the floor where he lay.

“Blesss it,” he hissed. “I mussst hurry.”

As calming as it felt at first to finally break the eerie silence, it quickly turned out to be a bad idea. Or an unsettling one, at the very least. Because, Crowley could feel it clearly, this wasn’t just the return of his tendency to hiss in anxiety. This was an echo of the very same power he had already been subjected to once. If ever he would have had any doubt, now he could be certain beyond the shadow of a doubt that Raziel’s book was near.

He only had to get past the floating golden letters first.

Shaking his head to clear it of the unexpected (and vaguely blessed) radiance, Crowley scrambled to his feet and deciphered the series of obscure sigils with ease. (All that time spent with possibly the most bookish angel in existence did not just pass without a mark.) The twinkling combination of thin, glowing threads was only a simple question:

_ What do you seek? _

_ “The Book, of course,” _ Crowley thought. It did not sound like an acceptable answer, not even in his head. So, what would Raziel – and by proxy, his Book – value? 

“Knowledge,” the demon mumbled. The sigils of light fell upon the floor immediately, only to reveal a messy collection of tiles on the floor, each of them inscribed with a letter. This was… almost too easy.

The boulder and the chamber both trembled with the force of an enormous impact. Although no breaks were showing just yet, Crowley could hear myriads of tiny cracks race through the walls, the floor and the ceiling – the entire system of tunnels, as it were. To punctuate the sounds of imminent collapse, Rahab let out another angry cry – right on the other side of the boulder.

“Knowledge,” Crowley repeated, forcing himself to focus on the task at hand instead of imagining all the ways the larger demon could torture and kill him once he got in. “K…” he started spelling it out, and put his left foot on the tile with the letter _k_ on its centre.

In the next moment, he jumped back against the blocked exit, just to get as far away from the electric burn of heavenly light that had abruptly begun streaming from the cracked tile.

The boulder shook as Rahab rammed into it again. One or two more such collisions, and it was sure to give way.

“Blessed angels and their _fancy_ ways,” Crowley murmured. He got up again, and jumped on a different tile with feigned confidence. “S…”

So far, so good.

“… a… p… i… e… n… t…”

He stopped short.

“Seriously? Jump all the way back over there?!”

A crack appeared on the boulder after the next impact. Crowley did his best to shake off the mind-numbing dread, and leapt again.

“… i… a.”

Two things happened at once: a dizzyingly high replica of the Tree of Knowledge materialised right in front of Crowley… and Rahab broke into the chamber.

“Serpent!” he snarled. Although he had given up his beastly size and appearance for the moment, he still did not sound entirely human-like. “You will not lay your tainted hands on the Book!” Rahab yelled on the top of his lungs.

“Lisssten, let’sss jussst talk about thisss…” Crowley tried. However, he swiftly found himself thrown across the room, probably sporting a sizable bump on his head and a concussion to last. He still could count himself lucky that his currently useless wings hadn’t been broken.

By the time he finished taking catalogue of his injuries, Rahab seemed to have forgotten about him entirely. Instead, he was completely immersed in staring at the ginormous tree, trying to pick different pieces of fruit from it, and snatching his hand away repeatedly whenever said fruit would turn into light, and he would get burnt.

Watching him finally made one thing clear to Crowley: Rahab wasn’t especially smart. He might have possessed nearly archangelic (now archdemonic) strength, he might have been a devout admirer of the Book (and, by proxy, its author) all his existence… but he was also… _just Rahab_. He was strong and arrogant like all the higher ranks, but he was missing any quality that could measure up to Raziel’s holy wisdom. Or even to Crowley’s nervous, mundane wit.

In the meantime, the choice was narrowed down to two identical green apples. Save for those two orbs, the tree had been plucked bare. (Rahab’s entire form was still smoking from the aftermath.) He reached for the apple to his right…

“No, sssstop!” Crowley cried out, even he had no idea why. Rahab would surely not listen, and, more importantly, why did he want to save the other demon, again?

“Silence!” Rahab rumbled, and gave Crowley a shove of raw occult power for good measure. Before the serpent could have regained his voice, Rahab’s fist closed around the apple… and he was reduced to a pile of ashes in the blinding flash of light that followed.

Crowley let out a long (still slightly hissing) sigh. Witnessing the permanent death of any demon was always terrifying in a very unique way. 

“He dessserved it,” Crowley mumbled, mostly just to convince himself. Rahab _had_ discorporated Aziraphale, after all. And far too little time had elapsed since the fifties for Crowley to let that go unpunished. Not that he had much to do with this… But who was he to stop natural selection, if it wanted to work among the ranks of demons, too?

After a few brief minutes of well-deserved rest, Crowley got to his feet, limped back to the tree, and sank to his knees next to the other demon’s ashes. 

“This isn’t the Garden,” he told himself. Anything was better than the unnatural silence. “It’s not the real Tree. The fruit is not a fruit, and it can’t be taken. It’s Raziel’s Book on an emerald tablet, and the original apples were red, anyway. Any self-respecting demon knows that. So. This is the _Sefer_ , and _that_ knowledge can’t be taken. Blessed proud angels.”

He bowed his head, and reached forward, his hands locked in a gesture of humble begging. Nearly deafened by his own frantic heartbeat, Crowley whispered the incantation he had heard from the late Rahab about three millennia before the demonic angel’s demise. He finished the spell not a moment too soon, just as the ever less fruit-shaped tablet fell into his slightly trembling hands.

In the very first instant of contact, the unnatural paralysis vanished without a trace. Nothing was compelling Crowley to hiss anymore, or keeping him from changing shape, and his wings filled with glorious life again. He wasted no time flying out from the severely damaged cavern. As he left the whole Dragon Triangle behind, he briefly debated whether he should feel grateful to Rahab. Without the deceased demon’s spell, after all, Crowley would have had no idea how to prevent the holy artefact from burning him (or worse). But then again… it was Rahab. He doubted anyone truly missed the bastard.


	16. Pain is So Close to Pleasure

_ 12 December 2020 (N. S.), St James’ Park _

It was nine o’clock, and keeping people from noticing anything was becoming rapidly more exhausting and utterly boring at the same time. Far from enough to keep Crowley’s own mind occupied. And he would have desperately needed the distraction…

* * *

He had arrived home with exactly fifty minutes to spare, his wings aching from the exertion he had grown unused to, his clothes in charred tatters, his hair damp with half-congealed blood, and most of his skin covered in scars or burns from low-grade holiness. Even with a shameless series of very vain miracles, it took Crowley nearly half an hour to look close to presentable again. He would have gone on to fuss about recreating an “effortlessly” cool appearance…

… but he couldn’t let the ceaseless, shaky ringing of the doorbell just go on and on and on. And once he answered it (twenty minutes to eight), he sort of forgot about his original plans. He signed for the big, mysterious box in an illegible scribble, and tore the packaging open while he was still kicking the door shut.

He didn’t have to count the rainbow-coloured candles to know there were exactly one thousand of them. He could easily envision the Them, a band of _supposed_ adults, enthusiastically counting and recounting them before sending the package on its way. Probably only a few hours prior to its delivery, putting their unshakeable trust in things working out how they wanted them to. Even when they were up against mailmen.

Was the gesture over-the-top? Sure, but hadn’t the whole Indiana Jones-style questing been, too? A millennium rolled around only once in history.

With these thoughts, Crowley took the candles, covered the hard-earned artefact in velvet packaging, complete with an elegant black bow, and rushed to the park to make the final preparations. Which would, apparently, now include wishing a giant cake into existence to fit all the candles.

* * *

He had thought the candles were store-bought. To be fair, they might have been, but that certainly didn’t stop them from being enchanted. Based on their size, none of them should have been able to last over an hour once they had been lit. Yet here they were, burning ever brighter.

Just like Crowley’s worries.

Seeing as this was a decidedly exceptional occasion, he kept telling himself to be patient. But it was half nine now, and standing on the footpath crossing the lake with a man-sized cake that put a Christmas tree to shame… It was doing things to his mind.

Taking deep, not at all calming breaths, he fished out his cell phone from his pocket, and dialled his angel’s number. His hands were trembling a bit with every annoying beep of the machine, his heartrate growing a little faster and a lot more erratic with every missed ring.

Even when he was calling for the thirtieth time, one whole hour later, and Aziraphale was still not picking up.

While the greater part of Crowley’s mind was preoccupied trying to come up with tactics to avoid thinking that the angel had forgotten all about their rendezvous, or that he didn’t even care about the anniversary, these very thoughts were always just a tiniest bit ahead of his efforts. And who could blame him? While he had been moving every stone for a suitable present for two months, the blasted angel never even tried to call him. Or write him. Heck, he would have even taken an old-fashioned compulsory summons over this silence.

_ “But what if something has happened to Aziraphale?”  _ his mind finally supplied. As far as excuses went, it was a good one. As far as worries went, though… this theory made everything so much worse. Forgetting all about the brightly lit cake (angel cake of course), as well as subtlety, Crowley took off from the park on mildly protesting wings. 

He wanted to go so fast that he nearly crash-landed in front of the bookshop. The windows were still brightly lit, so seeing inside was no problem. Seeing the scene that greeted him, however…

Aziraphale was perfectly fine (thank Someone), sitting behind the counter, leaning over an old codex, without a care in the world. Expertly ignoring the phone right next to his plump, ink-stained hands.

That was as far as Crowley’s denial and self-control went.

“He’s forgotten,” he whispered, to his own utter horror. It sounded even worse, when it was more than a thought. A statement of fact.

“He doesn’t care,” Crowley went on, his hands balled into fists so tight that his nails were drawing blood.

“Well, then, neither do I,” he added, and stormed off into the night.

He was far past the point of caring about the explosions or the fire that kept most of the city’s inhabitants awake that night.


	17. My Melancholy Blues

_ 13-24 December 2020 (N. S.), a linear combination of the pubs in London _

“Excuse me, Sir, but could you either pick up your phone or put it on silent mode? It has been going off ever since you came in,” the waiter pointed out to the dark-haired man sitting alone in the corner. He received a _look_ from behind cracked sunglasses, and did not go near that table ever again. Interestingly enough, the table still never ran out of wine.

Half an hour later, Crowley grumbled, and checked his messages.

_ “What on Earth happened?! Why didn’t you call us?! We even offered!!!” _

That was a text from Brian, but currently Crowley couldn’t remember the reason for his outrage. Nor did the particularly care.

_ “Just be glad you didn’t pull this stupid stunt in our town,” _ Wensley pointed out in one of his very wordy and lawyer-y messages.

_ “Pictures! Now!” _ Pepper demanded.

_ “Hey, are you all right?” _ Newt was inquiring. _“Anathema has been calling both of you non-stop. Just pick up when you can, okay?”_

“That would be exactly never,” Crowley mumbled, slamming the phone on the table. There was no _both_ of them. There was him, with important vices to indulge in, and there was the blessed angel, who could do whatever he wanted to, as far as Crowley was concerned.

He sighed. People were staring, and it became progressively more annoying. He ought to move on to the next drinking establishment. Too bad he had already been to all of the closest ones.

* * *

Crowley nearly fell asleep driving. He thought some music might help keep him awake, though.

_ “Can anybody find me somebody to love?” _ the supposedly instrumental track whined. Of course: it had been over two months since he’d even sat in the Bentley. And these newest players didn’t even last two days, let alone two weeks. Months were out of the question.

He reserved himself to singing along to Queen’s greatest hits. Had he been more sober, he could have even appreciated the melodies. In his current state, volume was his primary focus.

* * *

At some point, unable to remember where he had last parked his beloved car, he wandered back into St James’ Park. Not that he was able to recognise it. The candles had really been made magical – so leaving them unattended wasn’t exactly a bright idea. It took the fire brigade hours and hours to put out everything, and by that time, it was definitely too late for any plants.

A lone drake was waddling along the edge of the blackened water in the pond, sending disapproving quacks Crowley’s way.

“Bless you too, mate,” he practically growled back at the clueless bird.

* * *

He ended up giving away his phone in a drunken haze – all he asked in return was that the man who would take it text or tell everyone to just leave him alone. When that was settled, he finally headed back to his flat (visiting a few more pubs on the way, leaving behind a minor fight everywhere), fully intent on sleeping through a few more centuries.


	18. It's Late

_ 25 December 2020 (N. S.), the epicentre of noise complaints in Mayfair, London _

“All right, already, I’m on my way!” Crowley yelled, turning down the radio with an irritated thought. The doorbell had been ringing for three hours straight, but now that he actually opened the door, he found nobody there – only a small package was waiting for him on the threshold.

_ “Sorry mate, you’ve got some terrifying friends,” _ the note read on its top. Then the little box started vibrating as the phone inside began to ring.

Curious and annoyed in equal measure, Crowley picked up his cell.

“Oh, finally! Is it you this time, dear boy?” Aziraphale asked impatiently on the other end of the line.

But just… _how dare he_?!

“It’s me,” Crowley answered coolly. “What do you want?”

“Oh, thank goodness. What was this nonsense about giving up your phone? How was I supposed to reach you?”

_ You were not. _

“What do you want?” Crowley repeated irritably.

“Just, can we meet at nine in the park?” 

“St. James’ is sort of busted, Aziraphale.”

“Is it? Really? Eh, I’m sure we’ll figure something out. So, does nine work your you?” the angel pressed. Good to know that he didn’t care about any part of the world as long as he was comfortable. So maybe Crowley shouldn’t be this offended that the blessed creature had forgotten the Arrangement’s anniversary. But one still had to admire the thickness of his skin. Not a quip from him for over two months, and now he wanted to do Christmas?

“Not really,” Crowley only said. He had plenty of plants to spill the rest of this rant to.

“Oh, well. Um. But didn’t you want to… Are you sure you can’t make it at nine, my dear?”

_ So he actually remembered, just didn’t bother to show up?! That was even worse. _

“Don’t ‘my dear’ me. I can’t make it and I won’t. And that’s that.”

“All right, all right, de-… Crowley. Eight, then?”

“Nope.”

“But you said-“

“Look, Aziraphale. If you want to meet so badly, we can do it right now, or you can just forget it.”

“I, uh… one and a half hours? Yes, I definitely need one and a half hours still.”

“Why, where _are_ you?” Crowley asked, his curiosity winning over even his hurt feelings. He sort of envied the run-of-the-mill demons who did not have to deal with the latter.

“It’s not… it’s really not important. Please, Crowley? I can’t make this any faster.”

“… fine. Half six, the usual entrance. At least I’ll avoid the late carollers.”

“I wouldn’t call this late…”

_ Of course you wouldn’t, you bastard. _

“Was there anything else?”

“No… just… are you quite all right, Crowley? You sound so strange…”

_ As if you cared. _

“I’m fine,” he replied. His pride wouldn’t let him say anything else. “See you in one and a half hours. Don’t be late.”

_ Not anymore than you already are. _

“I’ll try my best-“

“Good,” Crowley mumbled, and hung up the phone.

* * *

He was momentarily astonished to find St James’ Park restored to its former glory underneath an ever-growing layer of snow. 

“Oh Lord heal this park?” he asked in spite of himself.

“I couldn’t very well let it stay all burnt down like that. Especially not for this,” Aziraphale replied.

Now that Crowley took a closer look, the angel was looking… weird. He couldn’t quite say _sharp_ or _elegant_ , not in a tartan suit. Only the style of his attire suggested that had probably been the intention – but the pattern and the colour scheme were just too distracting. Additionally, he seemed to have properly dusted himself off. Crowley would have bed anything that he had even tried to groom his wings.

… which was all well and good (albeit baffling). But where on earth had his eyebrows gone? Books did not tend to burn those down, and as far as Crowley knew, books had been the only company his counterpart entertained these days.

“What hap-… nevermind. What do you want?” the unsettled demon asked.

“Er… Shouldn’t we go inside first? I’ve made some plans…”

“Honestly, at this point I’m not interested in your Christmas plans, Aziraphale.”

“Christmas plans? No, no, no, it’s not about that at all. I’ve got plenty of time left for that.”

“If you call tomorrow plenty of time.”

“… tomorrow?” Aziraphale asked back, utterly baffled by the absolute simplicity of the statement. A look of horror passed through his face, and his eyebrows would have arched halfway up the sky, had he still had them at the moment. “That would explain the decorations…” he mumbled, still grappling with some barely comprehensible idea. Then, without warning, he grabbed Crowley’s hand.

“Aziraphale! What are you doing?! Let me go!” the demon demanded, but the angel summarily ignored him. He pulled up Crowley’s black sleeves, and prodded his fancy watch until it finally showed him what he was looking for. Namely, that the current time and date was 17:33, 25.12.2020.

“Oh, _fuck_.”


	19. With a Lot of Help From My Friends

_ 2 January 2020 (N.S.), a definitely closed bookshop in Soho _

Crowley had just left after their prolonged New Years’ celebrations, and Aziraphale remained alone in his bookshop (more of a personal library, if he was honest). Free to think of what this year would bring. Entirely free to realise that in December, it was going to have been one thousand years before that they made their Arrangement with his beloved demon. Oh, yes, this was going to be a good year.

* * *

_ 21 May 2020 (O. S.), a (just now) closed bookshop in Soho _

Aziraphale had only two major problems, really. One, that he couldn’t be sure Crowley would be interested in celebrating the anniversary of their Arrangement. Anniversaries as such were, after all, an entirely human concept. Both of them had been accused of “going native”… but were they native _enough_ for this? And if so… how was he going to give the perfect anniversary gift to Crowley?

_ What _ the perfect gift for him would be was not even a question. Aziraphale had all the information he needed to determine this, ever since the fifties. Even if he took a while to put it together.

No, the problem was not the _what_. Rather, the _how_. He had been trying to figure it out for months, labouring over obscure and badly written books in every moment of his time when he could be sure Crowley wouldn’t see it. But he had made very little progress – until he remembered to convert certain dates to the appropriate calendar system. Chronological and numerological references started to make much more sense after that. Aziraphale even managed to narrow down the problem to following the life and travels of one Christian Rosenkreutz, which was supposed to provide him with a pattern, which was a code for the ingredients of the spell he had been after all this time. Sometimes, Aziraphale thought, humans tended to overcomplicate things. Rosicrucians, especially. But if they were the best-documented group dealing with celestial harmonies, he was left with no choice but to trace their footsteps. Even if it meant that he basically ended up living his life according to the old Julian calendar. That way, at least, he would never forget the conversions.

* * *

_ 12 August 2020 (O. S.), Canterbury _

Forget a twisted love of triply obscured references in Rosenkreutz’s life. Feigning sleep this night was by far a greater challenge for Aziraphale then deciphering those historical codes. Crowley had just brought him to the very place the Arrangement was forged – a glaringly obvious hint, if there ever was one. 

_ “So he remembers! It’s important to him, too!” _ Aziraphale’s enraptured thoughts were singing. _“We must celebrate – it must be perfect! Oh, I have to, I have to, I simply must figure this spell out!”_

* * *

_ 30 August 2020 (O. S.), a nearly always closed bookshop in Soho _

After talking to Crowley, Aziraphale didn’t let go of the phone for the rest of the day. First, he called Anathema, offering her all the feathers and even reading privileges in his collection, if only she would help him.

“Calm down, Aziraphale,” Anathema said. “We’re friends, right? You don’t have to bribe me to get my help. Not that I’m refusing the feathers, mind you.”

“Thank you, dear girl. I just… this is very important.”

“Tadfield kind of important?” she inquired worriedly.

“No, no, not at all… This is… this is for personal reasons.”

“Colour me intrigued.”

“I have been working on a surprise for Crowley… You see, we have an Arran-“

“-gementsary coming up in December. I know.”

“Arrangementsary?” Aziraphale echoed. (He quite liked the word.)

“There is an ongoing debate whether Pepper or Adam coined the word, but basically… it’s contagious.”

“Has a nice ring to it.”

“Aaand with that comment, you just ensured Newt won fifty pounds from Brian. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome? I guess?”

“Brian bet him you wouldn’t like the word. Not archaic enough for you, or something. Anyway, what do you need help with?”

“Oh, yes. The spell.”

“You can’t do it yourself?”

“No, that’s not what I meant, sorry. I found a spell – a potion, to be exact – which I want to give Crowley for our… what was it? Arrengementsary. I’ve been working on it for a while; however, I don’t have enough time to gather all the ingredients. Some of them are quite obscure. I thought maybe you could help me out?”

“Sure thing. I’ve got enough family connections – it shouldn’t be a problem. Just give me the list.”

* * *

_ 29 November 2020 (O. S.), a not just nearly always closed bookshop in Soho _

Less than two weeks left until the big day, Aziraphale was impatiently staring into the cauldron in the back room. He had to make a few changes to Rosenkreutz’s instructions in order to speed up the brewing process, and he would still be cutting it close with the finishing date. He did not like that one bit.

And he was missing his beloved demon.

At first, he had been happy when Crowley announced he was leaving town: much easier to keep a secret that way. Especially when Aziraphale could barely spend any time in London, either. Sure, he had asked Anathema to help him gather the rare earthly materials, and she of course did admirably… But ichor and comet dust were just the simplest things he couldn’t ask fundamentally human witches to try and obtain. 

It would all be worth it, though. The look on Crowley’s face on the Arrangementsary… it would be the happiest memory for both of them, Aziraphale was certain. And in order to make it so, he had spent a considerable amount of time talking with Adam and his friends over the phone – whenever he was in an area with any reception. They all had families, after all: they could tell him much more about annual celebrations than his imagination, and provided much more reliable information than most books he had encountered on the topic. 

Armed with their advice and the potion, when it would be ready, simply nothing could go wrong.

* * *

_ 12 December 2020 (O. S.), a very unalterably closed bookshop in Soho _

__

Crowley was acting very strange. This was not at all how Aziraphale had imagined their phone call should progress. And now… he had one and a half hours to perform an incantation over twice as long.

He sort of expected the resulting explosion.


	20. Time to Shine

_ 25 December 2020 (N. S.) / 12 December 2020 (O. S.) , St James’ Park, London _

Crowley was no expert at dealing with breakdowns or panic attacks, especially not when they were happening to other people. He still saw it best to get the wide-eyed (and still comically eyebrow-less) angel into the park, away from prying eyes. They sat down on a bench near the empty pond, and Crowley was gently trying to get his counterpart to talk. This had been going on for about half an hour, when finally, _finally_ , Aziraphale broke his horrified silence.

“Oh, Crowley, I’m so sorry!” he blurted, his voice low and strained and tearful. “I’ve ruined everything, I’m so, so sorry!”

“I… argh.”

Crowley needed a long moment to collect his thoughts. Deep in self-pity as he had been, his first instinct was to just confirm the angel’s words: _“Yes, you have, you selfish idiot!”_

An older, wiser part of him, however, pointed out that such a reply would have been a case of a pot calling the kettle black. A _sappier_ , more human, and far stronger part of him added: and it would be a lie. Oh, and by the way, wasn’t it good to know that Aziraphale still hadn’t let go of his hand?

“No, don’t… don’t worry,” he ended up saying. “Just… angel, tell me what’s wrong.”

It took some more minutes for the shaken angel to find the resolve to do so. But once he opened his mouth, the truth just came pouring out, about everything. How he had been preparing for this day since the beginning of the year. How he had been working on a surprise. How he had asked so much from their friends. How he lived his life ingredient-hunting, and how he got stuck counting the days in the Julian calendar, because he was trying to trace the journeys of some fifteenth century doctor.

And that was it. All the reason for the whole December drama: Aziraphale had spent every waking hour working on numerological problems relating to pre-sixteenth-century human lives, and relating them back to present-day coordinates in space and time. So at some point, it became easier to just count the days according to the Julian calendar, and skip all the time demands and confusion of the conversions. Which meant that, due to the centuries that had passed since the calendar reform, the angel ended up numbering his days all wrong. To be more exact, he ended up thinking it was thirteen days earlier than it really was for the rest of the world – for normal people and man-shaped beings who used the Gregorian calendar. 

This was decidedly weird, but relatively harmless. Until the very moment that Aziraphale entirely forgot that eventually, he _would_ have to return to present customs, and restart counting his days in the Gregorian system. 

It was probably not the appropriate reaction to his counterpart’s inner turmoil, but Crowley still broke out in laughter. Light-hearted, relieved, healing laughter that never wanted to end, and that made him bonelessly slide down from the bench, onto the snow-covered ground.

He felt like he could fly without wings, just float up into the sky in his boundless joy.

_ “Aziraphale  _ does _care,”_ he thought, _“he does, he cares so much --- that he forgot. Not the anniversary. Just the rest of reality. He cares so much that he messed it all up, because… well, because. He is Aziraphale,”_ he concluded. _“My beloved, featherbrained angel.”_

“Are you…” said angel tried to ask, “Crowley, are you all right?”

The old serpent finally stopped shaking with laughter, and just grinned at his angel.

“Crowley, are you angry with me?”

“Do I look like I’m angry?” he asked, jumping to his feet. Aziraphale rose from the bench, too, and hesitantly looked him in the eye. (Well, at least once Crowley removed his sunglasses.) “No, angel, I’m not angry,” he said, solemn for a passing second. “I wouldn’t trade your birdbrained head for the world.”

“Do you really mean that?”

“Absolutely.”

“Thank you!” Aziraphale cried out, and pulled him into an embrace so tight, so desperate, that it brought a blush to the demon’s face. “Thank you, Crowley. Just… thank you. I always knew you had a heart of gold, but I could never imagine anything quite this bright.”

The slight pink coloration on Crowley’s cheeks? Was well on its way towards deep scarlet at this point. 

“May I still give you your present?” Aziraphale asked once they let go of one another.

Oh, finally: the chance to win back the upper hand.

“No,” Crowley said, “only after I’ve given you yours.”

“You got a present for me?”

“Of course I did, angel. Why did you think I disappeared for two months?”

“But I… Crowley, you really shouldn’t have.”

“Hmmm… let’s just see if you’ll say the same once you’ve actually seen it.” Crowley smirked. Suddenly, he thought it very lucky indeed, that he had never removed the gift-wrapped tablet from his pocket. This way, he could just conveniently fish it out now, and hold it out for the angel to take. “Happy Arrangementsary- wait, bless it, I did not mean to say that-“

“Happy Arrangementsary to you, too, my dear,” Aziraphale replied with a smile. He carefully removed the bow, peered under the velvet cover… and forgot to breathe entirely. Or to move. Or even say anything.

“Angel?”

Crowley actually had to prod his counterpart to get a reaction.

“ _Liber Razielis Archangeli_ ,” Aziraphale whispered reverently.

“You angels and your fancy ways with words,” Crowley grumbled good-naturedly, and rolled his eyes.

“Where did you- How- I- This-“

“ _Breathe_ , angel.”

“Crowley, this is amazing. Thank you, just… thank you so much! They never let me look at it in Heaven, then it got lost on Earth, and it is absolutely wonderful-“

“Hold up, they didn’t let _you_ take a look?” Crowley interrupted his counterpart’s excited rambling. “Why on earth not?!”

“I, er… well. If you must know, Raziel has never particularly liked me. Or Rahab. Not even before he fell and became known as Rahab. And I’m sure there are lots of others sharing the sentiment.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry too much. Rahab’s dead,” Crowley announced with all the nonchalance he did not possess. 

“What? How?”

“Call it natural selection. Rahab might have been smart enough to know the Book had built-in defence spells, he could even activate them… but he certainly could not get through them afterwards. I’ll tell you all about it if you’re curious. Just-“

“… not today,” Aziraphale agreed. “Especially since I still owe you your present,” he declared, forcing himself to tear his awe-struck gaze away from the emerald tablet. With slightly jittery moves, he reached into his own pocket, and offered up a tiny black phial. “Happy Arrangementsary.”

“That’s still a horrible word. But… happy Arrangementsary, angel.”

“Thank you, old Serpent.”

“So, what’s in this?”

“Our song, my dear. And everyone else’s, too.”


	21. Made in Heaven

_ 25 December 2020 (N. S.) / 12 December 2020 (O. S.) , St James’ Park, London _

Crowley felt suddenly very dizzy.

“You don’t mean…” he began, cracked voice getting caught on dry, chapped lips.

“ _Musica Universalis_ ,” Aziraphale confirmed.

“But. Angel. But demons can’t hear the Music of the Spheres.” Crowley finally managed to voice his protest.

“Well, I found a potion that can give you back the ability. It’s… funny, actually it’s based on a reworked fragment of the very same Book that you gave me.”

This only seemed to confirm that the potion was real. That it would work. Because – as Crowley had experienced first-hand – if there was anyone (other than God) who both knew how the very essences of angels and demons could be manipulated, and did it with terrifying ease… it was Raziel.

“How does it work? Do I just drink it?” Crowley asked hungrily. Then, because he recalled how exactly those first-hand experiences went, he added one more question. “Are there any side-effects?”

“Yes, you only have to drink it… and listen, I suppose. No side-effects are mentioned, and I don’t think there should be any, either. But if you don’t want to risk it-“

“Angel. Ssshut up,” Crowley hissed, his hands already closing around the phial with the same reverence Aziraphale had showed for the Book.

“Crowley, wait,” Aziraphale said quietly, which made his counterpart’s hand instantly freeze around the cork.

“What is it?”

“The… the Music. It’s not the same as you remember,” the angel explained reluctantly.

“How do you mean?”

“The Fall, it… it’s like a never-ending scream in the heart of the cosmos. It’s destroyed the harmony – no one can listen for too long. I’m sorry. It’s not something we usually talk about, but… Crowley, it’s not just the Fallen who lost the Music. It’s everyone.”

“I don’t care,” Crowley declared. Staring deep into his angel’s eyes, as if daring him to try and stop what was going to happen, he opened the phial, and downed the contents in one go.

For a moment, he felt as though liquid starlight had flooded his corporation – and then it spread beyond the physical constraints, cutting him off from his every sense. However, as fast as it began, the violent reaction came to an end, and all the destruction it had caused, was abruptly healed. Along with one specific kind of destruction that the potion had _not_ caused.

And Crowley was left to listen in awe to the Music of the Spheres.

It was by far more beautiful than he had remembered. Loud, but not hurtful, captivating, but not harmful, clear and rich and brighter than the sum of its parts - brighter than every star in Creation.

“... Crowley?”

Some part of him: some tiny, weary, earthbound part knew that was what Aziraphale was saying. His worldly name, a uniquely imperfect string of sound younger than the creature it belonged to. That was, however, not what he really heard. Not what the Cosmos was singing to him.

“Crowley? Dear boy, are you quite all right?”

“Y-yes,” he answered, hesitant to disturb the rumbling melody with such a banal note, and worried that he would end up yelling. It quickly became clear, though, that he needn’t have been.

“Is it…”

“Angel, it’s… mesmerising.”

“But the Fall-”

“I can hear the Fallen,” Crowley blurted out. He didn’t mean to dwell on this, let alone share the unexpected discovery with his angel right exactly on this special day… But it came out. It was an entirely new choir, omnipresent in the melody of the universe, and, contrary to his every suspicion, Crowley did not find it dissonant, ugly, or horrifying. It had its place in the chorus - it had always had.

“I’m really sorry?” his counterpart offered.

“No, Aziraphale… I can _hear_ them. Really hear them. Not just screeching, but _them_. And the Song… it still knows their names! It _knows_!” Crowley cried out, his surprise, joy and selfless rapture completely unbefitting of a demon. 

“I wish _I_ did,” Aziraphale whispered in response. Somewhere, someone - some deranged composer - tied a cello to a lonely comet and let both the minor planet and the abandoned instrument cry their longing into vibrant threads of ether. “I wish I knew your name - but it’s impossible. All that any angel can… all that I can hear is the screeching in the place of the Fallen, ever since they had been cast out. But I wish I knew your name, Crowley.”

“But you do, angel.” Crowley smiled patiently. For a split second, their roles seemed to be reversed, the divide between their angelic and demonic natures forgotten. “Maybe you can’t say it… but you do. I hear it every time you speak to me. And thank you,” Crowley said softly, leaning forward to seal this confession with a kiss.

“Crowley…” Aziraphale breathed.

_ “Cathetel,” _ the Cosmos sang in response, with waves upon waves of triumphant, unconditional love that encompassed all sound and all being, from the maddening spins of the great Jupiter, through the slothful, eccentric revolutions of tiny Pluto, to the nigh-imperceptible hums of a slowly rotating galaxy.

And, under the softly falling snow, Crowley thought: it would keep singing, for the both of them, for ever and ever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To anyone that cares: Sorry that it took so long to upload here, I kept being interrupted in the process.


End file.
